


words they're not saying

by therestisconfetti



Category: Victorious
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-15
Updated: 2017-08-15
Packaged: 2018-12-15 13:50:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11807244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therestisconfetti/pseuds/therestisconfetti
Summary: Cat Valentine is Jade West's best friend; she can read her like a book. When she doesn't understand, she watches.





	words they're not saying

**Author's Note:**

> There are references to various episodes throughout this, along with an AU in which Beck and Jade don't get back together the second time.

Cat Valentine is Jade West’s best friend.

It may not look like it to the ordinary eye, but Cat’s been there for Jade even long before Beck Oliver was even so much as a thought in Jade West’s mind.

The small, wide-eyed girl recalls her first day of Hollywood Arts: lost and alone until a skinny brunette with vivid blue eyes (but no studded eyebrow - yet)  and a daunting smirk asks her if she needs any help. Cat hesitates at first; the girl looks kind of scary and Cat isn’t sure she should be making friends with a mean scary girl. But then again, it doesn’t hurt to have someone intimidating on her side.

So that’s how Cat and Jade begin, sitting together at lunch as Cat learns about Jade’s obsession with scary things and scissors and Jade learns that Cat is very much one of a kind with her innocent questions and random comments. Jade lashes out at people and Cat is always making friends. Jade hates just about everything while Cat loves everything under the sun. They’re an odd pair, which either one of them will readily admit, but they just  _ work _ in a strange way.

Somehow, they balance each other’s extremities out. Jade brings Cat back down to everyone else’s world while the redhead isn’t afraid of the pale girl like most of the Hollywood Arts population is. Jade even goes so far as looking out for Cat, almost like a sister.

Cat also gets to see Jade’s walls come down. It’s slow and eventual, but Cat’s patient - she just watches Jade, ready for when she’s willing to share.

Jade shows up at her door in tears because some boy only went on a date with her because it was a dare and somehow she’d found out. The small redhead does her best to deal, making the crying girl a cup of hot tea and even rubbing her back in slow circles until she’s calmed down.

The gothesque girl makes her swear not to talk about it with anyone else.

Cat never does.

The rest of their little circle comes together slowly with Beck, then Robbie, then Andre.

Cat knows Beck Oliver will be around for a long, long time when Jade doesn’t immediately shoo him away. She knows he’s possibly the one when he can take her aggressive attitude and snappy comments, sometimes even hitting back with his own.

And he makes Jade happy; the kind of happy she hates to admit, but Cat can see it in her eyes and underneath her usual smirk because she just  _ knows _ Jade West.

(She doesn’t mind third wheeling, not when Beck is patient and nice and tells Jade not to yell at Cat for saying something weird at the most inappropriate times.)

Two becomes three, then four, and then five by the time they reach high school.

Cat likes her friends; she loves Hollywood Arts.

She understands the normalities of her life: Jade West leans on her when she needs it most, Beck Oliver loves Jade more than anyone else, and Andre and Robbie will always be around.

And then Tori Vega enters their lives. Things suddenly change.

(Jade hasn’t had a lot of girl friends over the years, at least not ones that stick around like Cat.)

Cat and Jade complement each other in the extremities, but Tori and Jade’s dynamic is something entirely different. She learns this over the next few years.

Cat can see the insecurities flaming in Jade’s eyes when Tori makes her appearance at Hollywood Arts.

She has never seen this before; not when girls flirt with Beck, not when someone challenges her for the lead part in a play. This is something entirely new, something Jade refuses to talk about - even with Cat when they’re alone with the door closed and music playing.

Yet for all the meanness Jade spews out at the new girl, Tori Vega doesn’t back down. In fact, she fights back with a feistiness not even Beck was capable of in his first encounter with Jade.

Cat knows things are changing, so she does what she always does when it comes to trying to learn new things about Jade: she watches.

It’s evident - at least, it is at first - that Jade sees Tori as her competition: pretty, talented, sweet. She immediately rivals Jade not only in singing, but also on the stage where Jade has been dominate of for so long. She refuses to admit they’re friends, although everyone else readily accepts Tori to their friend group.

Tori’s nice to Cat, hangs out with Andre, tolerates Robbie, and is able to talk to Beck without making those gross heart eyes that just about every other girl at Hollywood Arts does. But Jade still fights with fire, taking every opportunity to make a dig at Tori, give her a snarky comment or just roll her eyes.

When Cat asks, Jade’s eyes go wide and she screeches at her.

Cat doesn’t ask again.

And although Cat can read Jade West like a book - a special ability, she likes to think - she can’t seem to understand how Tori has such a big heart, never cutting Jade off like many other people would (see: fake black eye incident, for example).

Then, something weird happens.

Jade breaks up with Beck (not for the first time, Cat would like to point out) and Cat doesn’t find the brunette at her door in tears like she’s done so many times before. She can almost count on it like clockwork. Jade usually puts up a front at school, pretending she’s totally fine and unbothered that Beck is no longer her boyfriend and girls drape themselves all over him as they please. Then, she’s knocking on Cat’s door, tears and makeup streaking down her face as Cat makes her tea and promises things will be better.

Cat then notices the way Tori sticks by Jade in the days that follow the break up.

Jade has found a different shoulder to cry on, and Cat doesn’t get it at all. She’s not mad, not really, but she just wants to understand. How does Jade swear she hates Tori in one moment, but immediately run to her when she’s upset?

She does what she always does when it comes to Jade, she watches.

Tori and Jade’s friendship always seems to change. Tori is always nice, but she isn’t afraid to challenge the slightly taller girl. For all the effort Jade puts into making it clear that she and Tori  _ aren’t _ friends and that she, in fact,  _ hates _ the girl, it seems like she almost admires her.

Like how it’s Jade that comes up with a plan to beat those mean girls at Karaoke Dokie with Tori stealing the stage. And how she somehow knew that Tori would want donuts instead of frozen yogurt.

(How does she know that, anyway?)

Jade writes a play and lets Cat star in it. The redhead watches as Tori pulls it all together for her, how Tori has indirectly become Jade’s new shoulder to lean on even though she doesn’t want to admit it.

Cat’s not mad; she just wants to know why Jade won’t admit it to herself.

And Jade still gets jealous, oh boy does she get jealous when Tori and Beck are together for more than two seconds. But something shifts.

Cat isn’t so sure that Tori is seen the threat in terms of Beck anymore.

They bicker and go up against each other all the time. Whether it be when they’re all hanging out, going against each other for a part in a play, or that one time Tori scheduled prom - sorry,  _ prome _ \- on the same day as Jade’s showcase; Cat notices that Jade can bring out the competitive side of Tori.

But Jade seems to still care about Tori though, despite all her acting.

Cat realizes Jade is just putting on a front. At least, this is what she’s decided is her latest theory. She thinks that Jade has realized she’s too far into this little act of hating Tori to back out and like her now.

And when Beck and Jade break up again, this time in the biggest breakup Cat has ever seen between them, Jade still leans on Tori in the tiniest of ways.

They take Cat to San Diego, bickering like an old couple the whole drive there and all the way home. Cat likes to think they’re like her parents, having little spats but still caring about each other at the end of the day.

Not too long after their disastrous road trip, something changes yet again.

They’re the leads of Sikowitz’s play, having to play husband and wife. He forces them to go on a date and Cat doesn’t really know what happened - Jade just tells her it’s dumb and she’s never doing it again in her life - but something about their fake date at Nozu causes a shift.

Jade begins to hang out with Tori, as in, without their other friends around, and not necessarily by force. Neither of them end up killing each other, and sometimes she even catches Jade smiling - with the smallest of smiles - at Tori.

Cat thinks Jade might be falling in love.

She doesn’t say a word though, not wanting to deal with Jade’s predictable denial or Tori’s flustered series of incomprehensible excuses.

The redhead may act dumb, but she knows what really goes on in her little circle of friends.

Jade steals Tori’s spot in the Platinum Music Awards when she’s given the chance, and suddenly it’s like they’re taking two steps back. Cat knows it’s to get back at Tori and Beck because of how much time they’ve spent together, but she can’t seem to figure out if she’s trying to hurt one or both.

(She knows Jade still sometimes looks at Beck with a side of longing. But those hidden smiles and suppressed laughs for Tori can’t be ignored.)

But then Jade puts on her big girl pants and does the right thing and everything’s all right again.

Cat doesn’t know what happened, but she sees the way Jade looks at Tori with a proud smirk all night.

It’s only a few weeks later that it all falls into place.

They don’t tell anyone, not even Beck. Jade doesn’t say a word about it to Cat.

But Jade’s always disappearing and Tori is too. Sometimes they’re found around the city together, other times they seem completely off the radar.

Cat notices it, though. She knows Jade West like a book and she knows when she’s in love.

Jade’s usual jabs at Tori seemed to have lessened significantly since that night at the Platinum Music Awards, but maybe they’ve been coming less and less since their dinner date at Nozu - Cat can’t really tell.

(They’re still there - it wouldn’t be Tori and Jade without it, but it doesn’t seem as aggressive as it was before.)

She can see the way Jade and Tori try to sneak smiles and raised eyebrows at each other when they think no one’s looking. She sees the rare moment of Jade being gentle and Tori giggling quietly with her back against Jade’s car after school in the parking lot after mostly everyone has gone (Cat has to wait for her Nona to pick her up sometimes).

Sometimes, Jade shows up to class with swollen lips and a few strands of hair out of place. Cat makes a comment and Jade snaps at her.

Instead of telling everyone she knows, Cat smiles at them fondly even though they’re too wrapped up in their own little world.

She knows they’ll tell everyone when they’re ready, that this is a new dynamic they’re not used to after years of Jade lashing out and Tori being endlessly nice. This is something they have to figure out on their own, but when Jade comes over unannounced to Cat’s place looking nervous and excited all at once, she knows her suspicions were correct.

Cat Valentine is Jade West’s best friend, but Tori Vega fills out the missing pieces of Jade that Cat never could.

Tori Vega somewhat completes Jade West, and Cat is all for it.


End file.
